


Target demographic

by SrebrnaFH



Series: Time enough to just live [4]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies)
Genre: Avengers Merchandise, Endgame what Endgame, Everybody Lives, They live because fuck you AU, money issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-23
Updated: 2019-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-09 16:15:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21916630
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SrebrnaFH/pseuds/SrebrnaFH
Summary: Peter explains to Tony why people buy cheap knockoffs of Avengers merch.This happens BEFORE "Ruling with an iron ladle" (the lasagna story (first in this series)).
Relationships: Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Series: Time enough to just live [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1449895
Comments: 19
Kudos: 264





	Target demographic

**Author's Note:**

> Been shopping. Prices kind of sting when it's Disney related merch, so I had the vision of Peter complaining about Spider-Man stuff being to expensive for him to buy.  
Kind of went on from there.

"What is all of this?" Peter asked, surprised mildly by the state of the main room of the lab, as he entered for their regular Friday afternoon session.

"Cheap knockoffs," Mr Stark barked as he dropped a cup onto the pile of shards already there. "Bloody. Cheap. Knockoffs. That's what it is."

"Hey, hey, hey," Peter caught another cup just bare inches from it joining the others in their jagged, sharp fate. "Come on, why are you breaking them? It's not like they are glass, you can't really recycle pottery, or whatever they are."

"I know. The glass shit has already gone to be remilled into something useful. Just as soon as we verify they hadn't used anything seriously dangerous in the production process."

"Oh. I see. But why are you breaking them? They are OK. I mean, half of the kids in my neighbourhood buy the cheap ones. Not like they can afford the official stuff anyway. That is frigging expensive."

Sudden silence on his mentor's side made him look up.

"What?"

"Kids buy these...?"

Mr Stark sounded surprised.

He shrugged.

"Obviously. As long as the pictures are OK and the paint doesn't chip off to easily... Nobody got hurt by them either, so nobody really cares whether they are official or not."

"B-but..."

"Seriously, who _can_ afford the official shit? Backpack for twenty bucks? I mean, I go to an elite school and people anyway get their backpacks cut there every other day, so what do you think happens in an average Queens school? Nobody can afford buying stuff that expensive, or at least not to use it at school and then, if you won't use it, parents usually won't buy you another one, so why bother. I was considering buying one of the Spidey bags myself, but I lose so many I'd never be able to replace it in time. Can't make that much money stocking shelves, you know."

Silence.

"Mister Stark?"

"Yeah. I see. So... The official merchandise... who would buy it?"

"Flash. I mean, his parents basically pay him to not complain about them not being there, or so MJ says. He has everything Spider-man related, which is kind of funny, since he hates my guts. And he is all over the school with his backpack, his wallet, key fob and whatever. Even eyeglasses case with webbing on it. I must say it's a bit freaky to see Flash patting my face on his binder every time I have classes with him, but then, well. It's just the mask, not me-_me_."

"Peter?"

"Yeah?"

He looked up to meet Mr Stark's quizzical gaze.

"How much allowance do you get?"

"Um."

_Yeah. Bad subject. Seriously. This is the question you want to ask?_

"I mean, ballpark value. Order of magnitude."

"None."

Silence.

Some more silence.

"So how do you... where do you get money from?"

Peter shrugged again. As if he needed to explain basic stuff of life to his mentor.

"Mr Delmar pays me for restocking shelves. I can climb, so I'm better at taking down stuff he has on top shelves in the storage, and he doesn't know I'm not using the ladder. It's quicker this way."

"So...?"

"Seven-fifty per hour. I can work maybe five, six hours a week. And obviously, taxes, so that May doesn't get into trouble, so it's not much once I'm done. Maybe twenty-five dollars, on average. More like twenty, since I can't be there every day consistently, and sometimes when I come, he is already done with restocking or, whatever, someone else…"

"You work in a grocery store to get money?"

Seriously, adults.

"Duh. What else am I supposed to do? I can, like, sometimes, help people fix their computers, but this was an okay kind of income in my old school. In Midtown people mostly can do it themselves, so I sometimes do small jobs for neighbours, this kind of thing.... What?"

"It's just..." Mister Stark sighed. "This idiotic rule that we don't pay highschoolers, but have to put it into your college fund... I should talk to Pepper and change this somehow. But... do you need anything? And I mean it very seriously. Whatever, like, whatever - for school, for, for sports. A new phone," he started patting himself down and then turned to look through the drawers in the nearest cabinet. "Here. Just... Oh, just take it, kid."

Because Peter took a step back when he saw the shiny, shiny surface of the newest Stark Phone.

For one, he didn't need it. His old phone was still fine, despite the slightly cracked glass (he put a nice, even screen protector over it, so the edges of the glass did not cut his fingertips anymore), it had a good battery and, what was the most important part, it was his. It was normal. Common.

It was two years older than what anyone else in his class had, too. Which meant it was undesirable, uninteresting and very much a Peter Parker thing.

A new StarkPhone? Nope. No way.

He pulled his hands behind himself and took another step back.

"I don't need it," he ground out. "I'm OK just as I am now."

"Peter, stop being silly," his mentor sighed. "I seriously... What _are_ you doing?"

Peter was already by the lift.

"Sorry, Mister Stark. I just can't."

The man's shoulders slumped a bit as he dropped his hand.

"OK. OK, I'll... I'll put it away. I just thought you'd enjoy... never mind."

_Shit._

Now Peter felt guilty.

But. He just couldn't afford having a piece of tech that pricey on his person.

"It'd get scratched," he explained lamely. "I drop my phone a lot when I'm swinging. And I smash into walls, so..."

Mister Stark groaned.

"I'm not sure I want to hear you explain that," he rasped. "But I see your point. Still, we have some very lovely phones made for military..."

"Mister Stark!"

"OK, OK. Getting it. You love your old what, Ericsson? How old is this model anyway...? That you just can't accept a new phone because the old one would be sad. Fine. I'm— Just—"

That had been bad.

Mister Stark was now sitting over the heap of pottery shards and pushing them to and fro listlessly.

"You and your friends... You'd really rather have one of these knockoffs than the real branded thing?"

Peter relaxed slowly. That was a safer area - not perfectly safe, but safer.

"Y-yeah. I mean, there is really no 'the real branded thing' for most of the kids I know from elementary. In Midtown, most of the parents are well-off, so they can afford brand clothes and so on, but there are some kids on scholarship, like me, so..."

He looked down, at the sad little hill of broken cups.

"Like, say, if I wanted a cup. Like, with Miss Natasha, like this one. A hardcore fan who has money will pay anything - like, ten, fifteen, even twenty bucks. And then he will put it in his collection of superhero cups and admire it every day. Me? I'd _love_ to have a Black Widow cup. I mean, I'd keep it on my desk, wash it by hand and use it every day to drink from it. Because cups are for, well, drinking. But there is that point where something becomes too expensive to buy it and use it daily, right? It's too special to risk it. So I'd have to put the cup on the shelf and just have it to look at, but then I'd need something else... I can't explain it very well, OK? But basically, I can't afford to buy stuff I won't use and I can't use stuff that is too pricey, because I'd break it and then I'd be even sadder than if I've never had it in the first place."

Mister Stark, who had probably never been in a situation of finding something too pricey to use on a daily basis, nodded slowly.

"Three questions for you, Mr Parker. One," his mentor raised a finger. "What you're saying is, you'd not want to buy official Avengers merch because it's too expensive to use."

"More or less, yes."

"Second, this is a common situation in your neighbourhood, but not necessarily at school?"

"Yep."

"Point number two and a half... Don't look at me like that, it's a followup from two. Most seriously rich kids in your school are dicks?"

Peter rolled his eyes.

"Like Flash, for example," he checked his nails. "I mean, not necessarily _all_ of them, but many, yes."

"Point two-and-three-quarters and if you roll your eyes like this at me again, young man, they will get stuck like that forever."

Peter suppressed a sigh.

"So, question... Does this mean that average, normal students, like, say, you, can't afford this stuff, but the rich dickwads can?"

"Not everyone can be divided into poor OK people and rich dickwads."

Mister Stark glanced at him with a small smile.

"You are still young, kid. You'll grow up and you will see that most rich people are dickwads."

"You aren't."

He looked away immediately.

Mr Stark only snorted.

"The fact that I'm being nice to you doesn't change the other, older fact, that I'd been a total douche for quite a long time. Towards too many people to even count."

"Ms Potts."

_That_ made the man think.

"OK, I concede. Although there are numerous people on this Earth that would swear that woman has no soul, heart or any other internal organs that would make her human and that she is an automaton I created to replace me. She _is_ ruthless when she wants to be."

"But that doesn't make her... well."

Mister Stark nodded slowly.

"Question number three..." he trailed off, then frowned and looked at Peter, his lips drawn into a thin line.

_Uh-oh, shit._

"Here we are, talking about good and bad merchandise and the best example of what you'd buy is a cup with _Natasha_? Why not any of the others?"

"Because she kicks butt," he answered immediately.

"And I don't?"

"You do. But she scares me. And most of the kids. I mean, seriously. If you are fifteen and you are _not_ scared of Miss Natasha, there is something wrong with you, honestly."

"So there are kids who aren't scared of her?"

Peter nodded quickly.

"Flash, for one. He says she is just a girl, so anyone could beat her and he thinks you guys just let her spar with you because she's, you know."

His mentor's brows went up.

"Uh. Sexy."

There was a beat of silence.

"He has totally hots for her and no I never wanted to hear it but he does and seriously this is an image I want to delete from my brain but I can't. So. Sorry."

Mr Stark's lips quivered.

"...and he thinks none of you are able to show her 'a good time' and I'm seriously scared for him if she ever hears about but at the same time I kind of wish to see her destroy him, too..."

"So if you went to school on Monday decked out in Natasha's merchandise, what would be the reaction of your peers?"

His mentor sipped his coffee, watching him from over the cup.

"Kinda... depends? I mean, MJ would probably high-five me, Ned would be totally jealous because his parents do not, quote, subscribe to the cult of the heroes and modern demi-gods, end quote, so they are ready to buy him anything related to Star Wars, but that Mjolnir pencil case he had to buy with his own savings."

"And others?"

"Flash would make fun of me, but that's kind of independent on what I do. I'm sure if I took off my mask in the middle of an action and revealed my identity — which I'm totally not going to do! — he'd ridicule me for trying to pretend I'm Spider-Man and for being a fake. So. Kinda, you know. No matter what I do."

"What about IronMan stuff?"

Peter shrugged.

"They anyway think I'm your fanboy, so what's new. Some would make it a proof that my internship is totally fake and that's why I try to do stupid stuff like..." he trailed off.

Because his mentor had just sliced his finger open on a shard of bright yellow cup and was now swearing as he washed the cut out under a stream of water.

"First aid kit?" Peter asked quickly.

"Under the sink. No, no, the other one. Yep. Bandaids in the... Yes, just take the biggest one."

He carefully wrapped the injured digit and sat down, watching as his mentor pushed the chunks of cups into a box with a small brush.

"What are you going to do with them?" he asked carefully.

"Grind them up and send to a lab. This way we'll see if they didn't use any kind of harmful component in them."

_What?_

"Like... for example?"

Mister Stark looked up at him, eyes tense.

"Lead. Cadmium. Cobalt. To name a few. They are common ingredients of paints and glazes. Unfortunately, the FDA regulations are too easy to circumvent in some cases and even if there is no malice, there may be simple stupidity affecting the people who make these things. They cut corners to bring the costs down, they replace components... Use defective sealants. A lot of things may go wrong in this kind of production."

"That is so wrong—" Peter shook his head. "And the official stuff is made in a better way?"

Mister Stark's posture stiffened.

"Of course it is," he grunted. "There are certifications, workers are being paid proper money, materials are quality controlled... And all the profit goes towards the relief fund."

Oh yeah. Sometimes he forgot.

The main reason the official merchandise even existed.

The Fund.

Avengers - and him, as a junior, aspiring member - and other vigilantes - were not only the force for good. Or at least not always. Many people saw them as a menace, despite the fact that they got rid of much bigger issues before they got out of hand.

So, the relief fund. The Stark Relief Fund, which became the Avengers Relief Fund quite recently. Used as a means of helping civilian targets that had been affected by the activities of the team in action. It was _not_ used to pay for things like the runaway truck that Peter had stopped three weeks earlier, since it was the driver's fault for not making sure it was parked correctly, but it was used to reimburse the old lady whose little Mini Cooper was crushed by the truck going sideways when Peter finally did stop it. Also, for the fence he went through when the truck pushed him back the last few steps.

The same happened after the last team action. It was carefully calculated who of the people affected by it was in fact involved in calling the creatures to the city, and so excluded from any relief funding, who was affected by the creatures before the Avengers arrived at the scene (to be paid by the guilty party) and whose damages were caused by the team directly or as a side effect of the monsters being disposed of. Only the last two groups would be seeing any of the Fund money, despite all the protests from various parties who insisted that Avengers should also be paying for the damages caused by them being late.

Luckily, the lawyers Mr Stark had found managed to get that last group removed from the claimants list, as that opened way too many ways for the Fund to be scammed for money.

However much Peter would have wished to pocket at least the fraction of the money his own merch brought, he actually preferred it being given to the Fund, since it was, by their contract with the city, his insurance. By participating in the merchandise trademarking, he was ensuring he would not be personally prosecuted for damages, should he produce any that the city could try to collect on. All the superheroes and many of city vigilantes joined in when Mister Stark had brought the topic up and offered to manage the finances for a common cause.

Still.

The merch linked to it? Way too expensive _for himself_.

Yeah, it was a bit of a conundrum.

Also, one of the reasons he never bough from either of the sources.

He totally understood his friends who couldn't afford to buy the official stuff.

He also knew, deep down inside, why Mister Stark was so pissed off at the knockoffs.

"Well, anyway, if you go to any of the official shops, they usually treat you like a pest," he sniffed. "Ned said they were looking at him all the time when he was checking the pencil case aisle. Like, seriously, they sell school stuff but suspect school kids who come to buy it?"

He wasn't even looking at Mr Stark as he said it, since the man was busy putting the crate of the cups away, but glanced up at the sudden angry sound his mentor made.

"What?"

"They do _what_?"

"They do customer profiling," Peter explained. "They suspect every kid of shoplifting, like in any high-end place."

"Wait, wait. Back. Fred went to the official shop to buy his Thor pencil case?"

"Ned. And yes, he wanted to have the real stuff, he said."

"And they were watching him suspiciously?"

"That's what he said."

"Was it more of a 'security guard watching him from a distance' or 'someone following him and watching his hands'?"

"I don't know," he shrugged. "I mean, seriously, what's the difference? He was being watched, OK? He felt uncomfortable with it. Not like it never happens to any of us. I'm watched in Target most of the time. No biggie."

"Peter."

He looked up again, apprehensive.

Mister Stark was counting out some cash.

In twenties.

"Come on, kid. We're going shopping."

"What? We were supposed to do that thing..."

"Tomorrow. I'll call May and ask her if you can stay the night and we can do the engine thing tomorrow."

"But, what's the hurry...?"

"Leave your things, just take an empty backpack. And think what you are going to buy."

Peter stiffened.

"What?"

"If I go in, they will go all 'Mr Stark' on me. You, however, are a perfect standard customer. In fact, you are the exact demographic the marketing board was telling us we would be targeting."

"Which is obvious bullshit, because my 'demographic' doesn't have two dollars to rub together and if we did, we wouldn't spend it on backpacks that cost twenty a pop or face wipes with the Cap's shield on it, five bucks a tenpack. School stuff, yes. Pencil cases or phone covers, OK. Maybe some stationery, but there isn't a boy in my school that would be caught alive with a pillow notebook with Hulk pattern and most of the girls would die rather than show with _anything_ Hulk patterned. The Cap, Thor or you, OK. They could say that they bought it for hero-worship. Or because you guys look good on these. Hulk..." he shook his head. "Hulk on a pencil case is OK. Hulk on a package of face wipes, not so much. If you catch my drift."

His mentor's eyes narrowed.

"So... Cosmetic products with the Big Green...?"

"Totally not a thing anyone would buy. Like. Nope."

"But there are people buying them."

"Maybe collectors. And hey, it's fine if collectors add money to the Fund. I'm OK with it. But they aren't buying them to _use_ them. Like, seriously."

Mr Stark gave him a slow nod.

"OK, so this is what we are going to do. Right now, the shop I know of should still be open for at least two hours. Happy will drive us, you will hop off a block away and walk up to it. I'll give you a hundred bucks, in tens and twenties, just so that you don't look like a total plant. We wait for twenty minutes and if there is any problem, you text me, and if there isn't, I'll go in after these twenty and we check how their behaviour changes, OK?"

"And what am I supposed to buy?"

"Anything you wish. Pick what you would have bought if you were just buying for yourself, or a present for Ted. Basic stuff. And make a note of anything you see that _nobody_ from your circle would buy, no matter the cost."

"Like Hulk face wipes?"

"Exactly."

He emptied his backpack and pocketed the hundred safely as his mentor waited impatiently.

That was going to be fun.

Right?

####

It wasn't. What with the store security following him tenaciously for all these twenty minutes and finally trying to accuse him of something when he was trying to pick the earbuds - Hulk or Black Widow? Thor? Captain Danvers?

Well, in the end Mister Stark had intervened, the shop assistants made apologetic noises, Peter paid for his purchases and they returned to the Tower in tired silence. Now they were sitting at the bench, looking at the items he had chosen inquisitively.

"Mister Stark..."

"Yeah?"

"This cup doesn't even look different."

"What?"

"You still have that crate of knockoff cups?"

Soon there were two identical Black Widow mugs on the bench in front of them and Peter was squinting to see anything that would mark one of them as more authentic.

"Nope. Nothing. I mean, apart from the sticker on the bottom, they are identical."

"So you are saying that the knockoffs are as well-made as the original products."

Peter leaned on the table dejectedly.

"They are the same exact size, painted with the same type of paints, exact same pattern, same finishing, same glaze," he sniffed. "They smell the same, a bit plastick-y."

"But, since we can't expect the knockoff to be selling under the production cost, either someone had managed to make the same quality cheaper..."

"...or whoever is making them for you uses the same resources, so in fact, you should be paying less for your products?"

"Which I'm obviously not, since I have the cost-benefit calculations and we are paying for prime product. In fact, in case of most of the merch the influx into the Fund is minimal... So much that I've been adding to the budget out of my own pocket to cover the differences."

_Note for later: Mr Stark has been in fact paying all our damages all along._

Peter shook his head, picked both of the cups and brought them to the mass spectrometer bench.

"Friday, scan them and tell me if there are any differences in manufacturing between them - more than between items from the same lot. Paint composition, glaze, weight, internal structure, _anything_."

They waited for a few minutes in silence.

"I've completed my comparison and, except for the sticker, the cups are the same. They have been created from the same mould and with the same materials, down to paint lot."

"Which means they had been made in the same factory," Mister Stark concluded grimly. "And in the same machines, and..."

"Does this mean that you are getting cheated out of the money for the Fund?" Peter jumped up. "I mean... like, they should be giving much more money into it — and everyone who participated, they are getting, in a way, cheated..."

"FRI, get someone on tracking where the cheaper versions came from and give me full chain of production and delivery on our official merch. I will not be made fun of this way," his mentor barked. "And get all this rubbish to the lab, make sure they check what happens after exposure to heat, water etc etc, normal usage and washing."

"B-but—" Peter looked at "his" cup, biting his lip.

"You'll get it back once we confirm it's fine. And..." the billionaire hesitated for a moment. "FRI, set up a meeting with the marketing department for tomorrow... eleven. Eleven thirty, even better. The team responsible for the merchandise line, not necessarily everyone. Just key people. I need them to listen to the thoughts of a representative of the 'target demographic' for an hour or two."

"What about the rest?"

"The... ah, the rest? Leave them in the here. You'll get them back when we confirm they weren't cutting corners on their production, too. Wouldn't want for the earpiece to just come apart, right?"

"I—I will? Get them back, I mean?"

His mentor looked up with a frown.

"You've picked them, and tomorrow you will be with me at one of the most annoying meetings I can imagine. The least you can expect is to get something as a reward. If you help me convince them that Hulk facial wipes and—" Mr Stark grimaced with distaste "— Captain America cotton swabs are a bad idea, I will take you shopping for stupid merchandise myself."

With a sigh, he unzipped the backpack full of nearly randomly chosen objects.

"Hey, Pete? You did good today, OK? You explained your position, you held it, you discussed it with me using proper arguments. It was the correct thing to do, kid."

He nodded and smiled - maybe a bit tremulously.

"And tomorrow, you will tell the marketing exactly the same. Make them try to imagine the group who would buy that stuff and get them to think."

"What? I though I'd be just there to, like, confirm..."

A look shot from over the blue glasses silenced him.

"You convinced a billionaire that the merchandise he is selling is too expensive. You can convince five people from the marketing division that their decisions are crap. Now, come here and tell me, what do you think about this circuit? It's shorting out whenever we connect it starting from the left, but it's perfectly OK when we push it from the right..."

He gave the squishy car pillow another squeeze and placed it on the workbench under the window with a little pat.

####

"How did you know they were cutting corners?"

"Ah, Pep... You know. Instinct. I just had that hunch that there was something..."

"Tony."

"What? I _do_ have business intuition."

"Yeah, but more about things that go 'boom' than about small everyday stuff."

"..."

"It's because of Peter?"

"...it's because of Peter."

"Good CTO. Tell your intern the CEO says 'good job' and that there will be a belated birthday present waiting for him in your lab tomorrow."

"Pep...?"

"Natasha _signed_ some of them. Including a t-shirt."


End file.
